Friday, August 31, 2012

Continuing thoughts about sport, as the football
season is almost upon us and tribal clashes will soon be the order of the day.
I think I mentioned once before (maybe even more than once) the graffiti on
road signs all along the ethnic highway and even all over signs on smaller
roads, and some of it totally obscuring the sign, most of it meaningless though
I am told, something cryptic like G13, also found as graffiti on once pristine
walls, is the gate number at a stadium and is used by that particular tribe who
feel they have to broadcast the fact to the whole world, senseless as it may seem.
But then I doubt collectively they have much sense anyway. Certainly their
behaviour indicates as much. I haven’t seen or heard much in the news for a
while about football hooliganism in the UK but Greek football fans are prepared
to go to quite a length to create merry mayhem, even so far as to letting off
flares, throwing Molotov cocktails, setting fire to stadium seats and attacking
anyone including police who try to stop them but at least, as far as I remember
the last couple of seasons, there has only been one death, unlike Turkey where
a football riot resulted in any number as did one in Egypt.

The Americans seem to have come up with a neat idea in an attempt to stop
unruly behaviour. American football fans in the United States have been told they
must take a four-hour online course costing $75 (£47) if they are kicked out of
a game for unruly behaviour. The rules, which apply to most NFL teams, see
those who fail to take the course, or achieve the 70% pass mark, arrested for
trespassing if they are found at another game. One of the 14 topics of the
course is entitled "skills for becoming less impulsive and improving
judgment" and another five deal with alcohol. Dr Ari Novick, who developed
the course and also runs one for Major League Soccer, has said “We're not
trying to squash anyone's passion. We're just trying to say don't be violent.” Novick
takes $55 (£35) for each test taken, with charities receiving the remainder. Daniel
DeLorenzi, security chief of MetLife Stadium - the shared home of the New York
Giants and Jets - also demands a letter of apology before allowing re-entry. He
said: “Most of the time, they apologise for their behaviour.” Sample questions Behaving badly towards other fans, such as fighting, swearing or
threatening them, is OK as long as they deserve it.(Answer: False)Every fan has a right to like any team they wish. Using abuse language
towards fans who support teams you don't like will not be tolerated. (Answer:
True)
I wonder if it would work in Greece.
I remember going to sports matches as a boy and never experiencing such bad
behaviour among fans. Why has it changed so radically I wonder? There must be a
psychological reason somewhere.
P.S. A couple more examples of Shakespeare’s dealing in business and real
estate: ‘Bought from Walter Getley the
copyhold of a cottage and about a quarter of an acre of land in Walker Street, Stratford.’
Sept. 28th 1602.’
‘1605 July 24 Conveyance to Shakespeare from
Ralph Huband of Ippesley of the moiety of an unexpired lease of the corn and
hay tithes of Old Stratford, Welcombe and Bishopton, together with a moiety of
the wool, lamb, and other small tithes of the whole parish of Stratford-on-Avon,
for £440.’
Willy was certainly worth a bob or two. How much would £440 be in today’s
money do you suppose? £90000? Or more?

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

It is not just a mad mad world, my masters,
nor a bad bad world, nor a sad sad world; though it is in my opinion at times
all of these things, but it is an amazingly small world. A very large house at
the bottom of our lane, across from
the main road, was started all of fifteen years ago by a man named Manolis. A
year or so into the building Manolis died and his son took over but the house
remained an empty shell for all those fifteen years and we never expected to
see it finished, especially recently with finances being what they are. But lo
and behold! The house is finished and habitable because it was been bought by
two Israeli brothers who have spent a small fortune on it. The walled swimming
pool alone must have set them back fifty grand if not more. Anyway, a few
nights back (ago?) they threw a housewarming party and there I met a Greek who
started to talk about the Connaught Rangers mutiny in India in 1922, a subject
on which I wrote a play, so you can imagine my surprise that he knew anything
about it. It turns out however he was in London
in 1979 and saw my play ‘The 88’ at The Old Vic. Not only that but, when it was
published, he actually bought the script. It seemed that what intrigued him
enough to go and see the play in the first place was the, with one notable exception,
universal slamming it received at the hands of the London critics. Why, he wondered, did such a
good play (his words) receive this absolutely vitriolic criticism? He was full
of praise for the play, had a great evening in the theatre, and simply couldn’t
understand what the critics were on about. So I told him it really was quite
simple and (1) It is an Irish subject that does not reflect well on the British
and the English it would seem only like Irish plays if they’re written by
Irishmen about Irishmen leaving the Brits out of it and (2) It was a matter of
the most unfortunate timing in that it opened very shortly after the murder by
the IRA of Louis Mountbatten. It wasn’t just the critics who were up in arms
about it. A company called Trident Television sponsored the play and the
bigwigs of the company accompanied by their wives were at the first night and
stormed out at the end kicking up merry hell and the following morning
demanding the company name as sponsors be removed. This of course upset the applecart
as far as the theatre was concerned; one of the Old Vic directors, by the name
of Benham was heard to say ‘How dare they put on this play in my theatre?’ Note
that will you? My theatre. The Vic being his personal fiefdom of course. And,
instead of braving the storm, the powers that be weakly caved in and the play
came off in a few days.

Now what I will never understand is how it
got to a first night anyway if that was the general feeling; after all the
script was available for months before rehearsals even started so surely the directors
of Trident and the directors of The Vic must have known what the play was
about. Or did they not read the script? Or did they not understand the script?

I can only say the audiences’ reactions belied
the critics’ opinions. ‘The 88’ opened at the same time as ‘Amadeus’ which went
on to be critically acclaimed and a huge success whereas ‘The 88’ died an ignominious
death. But I am here to tell you, and I don’t care who knows it, I know which is
actually the better play. I would dearly love to see it revived and given its
proper appreciation without, as one audience member put it, my undoubtedly
being made the subject of a hatchets job but, alas, I doubt very much that will
ever be in my lifetime. But how gratifying to meet in Vamos of all places and 33
years after the event a Greek who not only went to see the play but who
appreciated it for what it was worth: small small world.

Monday, August 27, 2012

Crossword Puzzles – There is no way I could
attempt to solve one from say The
Times, The Sunday Times, or papers of that ilk. The clues in these are, as far
as my limited imagination is concerned, pure gobbledygook. Even the Daily Mail
on a Friday is beyond me. We get The Mail on a Friday for the film, theatre,
and book reviews. No, The Athens News is about my standard. Well, not even
that actually as I share it with Douglas and, between us, we usually manage to
finish it though lately there have been some clues so obscure we have had to wait
for the following week to find the answer and even then we don’t understand it
and cannot make the connection. Compilers of crosswords must have very devious
minds.

Well, the 2012 Olympic Games are long time
over. I have to admit to not taking very much interest in them. Lasted about
fifteen minutes of the opening ceremony, same for the concluding ceremony and
watched some of the diving; otherwise London 2012 came and went without a
splash. So what happens now? The games practically if not altogether helped to
bankrupt Greece
and what is the legacy apart from
that? Poor Greece managed
two bronze medals in London
and that is so sad.

In 2004, Greece
quite magnificently hosted the summer Olympics, its athletes soaring, but
today, the country is choked by the worst financial crisis in its modern
history - and sport, too, has been hit hard. There is no longer the money to
fix the air-conditioning inside the main track-and-field training facility in Athens. So Greece's
athletes are left to swelter. The crash mats are torn - the stuffing bursting
out - and the cushions on the equipment are fraying. The facilities have
crumbled - all in the space of eight years. As the gloss of 2004 has worn off,
reality has set in, the sporting legacy remains elusive and, for some, pride at
hosting the Games has begun to fade. Many of the venues from
the Athens
games lie idle, locked up and empty, simply rusting under a baking summer sun.
Attempts to sell the former Olympic buildings have failed. They're seen as
representative of the short-term vision that got Greece into its financial mess in
the first place. The hoped-for privatisation of many of the sites has been
thwarted by a mix of bureaucracy and mismanagement.
"We have these facilities. What do you suggest we do? We try to rent
them and we cannot", says Spiro Pollalis, who heads the company charged
with selling the largest Olympic area - the Hellinikon complex south of Athens, containing the old
city airport and many of the sports venues. He insists they should have been
torn down immediately after the Games, leaving the six million square metre
site free for possible private investors. Therein lies the problem, spending
millions of euros for three weeks of sport before dismantling the buildings
might not be the best use of a country’smoney.
Some estimates put the overall cost of the Athens Olympics at 10 billion
euros.In London the estimated cost of £2.4billion
resulted in a final amount of £9.3billion. What happens now?

My bedside reading these last few nights has
been a little paperback published by Pan Books in 1963, ‘The Perpetual
Pessimist’ (An everlasting calendar of gloom and almanack of woe). The
copyright holders are Daniel George and Mrs Hugh Miller and their research has
really taken them far and wide in their efforts to discover just how truly
awful life can be. For example we all remember the assassinations of people
like Lincoln, John and Robert Kennedy, Mahatma Ghandi, Julius Caesar, but what of Edward ll 1367, Richard ll 1400, Henry
lV of France, President Garfield 1881, President Carnot of France 1894, Peter
lll of Russia, 1762, King Umberto 1900, President McKinley 1901, King Abdullah of
Jordan 1951, King Faisal of Iraq 1958, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo
that led to the Great War, Czar Nicholas and his family, but just how many more
have there been? Joseph Smith, a founder of the Mormon sect 1844 for example,
well he was lynched. Remember this book was published in 1963 and there have
been a whole lot since.Some
assassination plots failed of course. President Truman, Hitler, James ll and
Napoleon lll escaped and the Cato
Street conspirators failed to assassinate Castlereagh
and his cabinet in 1820 but assassinations of public figures are much more
numerous than those listed above.

This is without taking into account
numerous wars, the sacking of various cities, the massacres in China and Pol
Pot’s Cambodia, the millions dead thanks to Stalin, the inquisition through
which hundreds and thousands of so-called heretics were obscenely, cruelly
tortured and killed, the holocaust, and ethnic cleaning, Shia versus Sunni and
vice versa continuing to the present day, The Taliban and al Qaeda. It would
seem, apart from his ability to
breed, man’s most common talent is his penchant for killing.

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Today is Douglas’s
birthday and we are going to celebrate by having a curry! What! A curry? In Crete? Yes, seriously, folks, our friends Helen and
Kristos used to run a little eatery in a village called Alexander Amagdali (Almond)
where we used to love to eat out quite cheaply, on the deck in summer looking
across to the mountains, and in winter, snug inside around the wood stove. That
was where the police chief sitting by the door fired off his pistol into the
road one night just for the hell of it or so it would seem. Cretans like guns,
fire them off at every opportunity. A law was brought in forbidding the firing
of guns at weddings, baptisms, festivals etcetera but the Cretan simply ignores
it, especially if he is from Sfakia.
The little taverna actually belongs to Kristos’ brother who lives in Athens and since the pair
gave it up it has started to fall into wrack and ruin which is a shame.

Anyway, they have recently taken over a
restaurant called the Stardust Tavern. It is situated in the most wonderful
spot high above Georgopoli with a panoramic view across the bay and beyond.
When we first ate there Douglas remarked that
it was like being on holiday again. It reminded us of those wonderful holidays
we took so many years ago in Plakias on the south coast that led to us deciding
to come and live here. And, if it should all goes pear -shaped now, we have at
least had sixteen fantastic years and never regretted a moment, made many
friends both Cretan and expats and enjoyed their company, hospitably, and generosity,
both materially and of the spirit; the constant ‘if you need anything,’ or ‘if
we can do anything.’ It really is a community and recently they have started an
organisation called ‘Helping Hand’ (in Greek of course – ‘vouithia keri’ – that’s
the best I can do) to raise money, buy food, collect clothes, bedding etcetera for distribution, to those in need on
the Apokoronas since the financial crisis that has hit some folk so very hard.
For example we are invited to a friend’s 60th birthday bash on Saturday
– no presents by request but a contribution to Helping Hand would be
appreciated. Mind you, looking at the heaving clubs, the crowded tavernas and
the bars in Xania, you wouldn’t know there was a crisis at all and that Crete
has the highest unemployment rate in Greece.

Anyway, back to Douglas’s
birthday. Every so often Helen and Kristos throw a curry night, it so happens
this one falls on his birthday, and here is the menu.

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

A boy who stabbed his foster carer to death after he was
grounded has been detained for seven years. The 14-year-old attacked
34-year-old Dawn McKenzie who bled to death after being stabbed 10 times on the
head and body. The court heard that, in the days leading up to the killing, the
boy's X-box, mobile phone and laptop had been taken from
him.

In his defence advocate Donald Findlay QC said his client had spent his
early years falling victim to physical abuse from
his natural parents - and that this prevented him from
learning the differences between right and wrong. He also said that his client's mental
condition meant he was unable to keep being grounded in perspective and was
unable to fully explain why he killed his carer. The court heard that the
teenager was suffering from a mental
condition, called a dissociative state, in which he was unable to properly
distinguish between reality and fiction.
Defense council naturally had to do his utmost to explain the boy’s behavior
and childhood abuse is a good enough excuse for sending someone off the rails
though in the millions of cases of child abuse not many result in murder.
Mental conditions are also pretty standard when it comes to an explanation but
if you were to ask me (and I could be far off the mark here but somehow I doubt
it) it had little if anything to do with abuse, mental condition or being
grounded but everything to do with the boy being deprived of his electronic
crutches at which he flew into a raging temper with this painful result.
I think I wrote once before about watching a family dining out here in Vamos
and how one kid was quite simply not a part of the evening’s roistering (they
seemed to be a very happy family otherwise) but was intent the whole evening in
playing with his I-pod or whatever it was, to the extent that he didn’t even
seem to be that interested in his food. An e-mail from
a friend (a computer whiz by the way) taking a well-earned break of a couple of
days out in the wilds had his two kids, as he put it, going cold turkey, deprived
of their gadgets.

A 17-year-old has out-tapped the competition to hold onto
the title of being the US's
fastest texter. Austin Weirschke from
Wisconsin beat 10 other competitors at the
sixth National Texting Championship held in New York. Contestants had to do one task
with their vision blocked and another with their hands behind their back.(That is something else, wouldn’t you agree?)
The competition - which is sponsored by LG Electronics and featured one device
with a physical keyboard - put three skills to the test: accuracy, speed and
dexterity. Two of the tests were straight-forward - memorising and then typing
phrases as quickly as possible, and translating text abbreviations into
"regular speak" such as TTYL (talk to you later). But others were
more challenging, including writing words backwards - or text sdrawkcab as the
round was dubbed - and having to tap out the words to the song Twinkle Twinkle
Little Star within 45 seconds while wearing darkened glasses that blocked the
competitors' view. Oh, hey! Oi vey! What
is the point?

This is the point I’m trying to make, Austin Weirschjke said
he typically sent 500 texts a day to his friends, but attributed his success to
added practice with his mother. The writer Malcolm Gladwell once wrote that
studies suggested that it typically took 10,000 hours - or 417 full days - of
practice to become an elite performer. Is there no better way to spend one’s
life than indulging in this futile occupation, concentrating on this little
gadget in your hand to the exclusion of all else, even if it did mean a big
monetary prize in the end. I mean, come on, get a life, listen to the birds,
smell the flowers, look at the mountains, pet your dog, talk to people, but
unfortunately this lack must apply to a whole generation, texting or playing
endless computer games.
We had an American visitor who was taken down south to visit the ancient
ruins at Phaestos and who spent the drive, instead of looking at magnificent scenery
he would be seeing for the first and more than likely the last time in his life
had his head down, eyes glued to his sat-nav, or I-pod or whatever it was, to tell
him exactly where he was.
When you stop for a moment to think about it, it really is sad. Reality can
only be experienced through an electronic device. That’s progress?
.
v

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Continuing my thoughts on Shakespeare I
think the biggest hurdle biographers have to overcome is not his boyhood with
all its attendant myths, or the lost years before his arrival in London, but
his return to Stratford where he would spend the last years of his life with
occasional visits to London mainly it would seem (there we go, it would seem,
perhaps, maybe!) on business and the purchase of property. He had money,
there’s no doubt about that or he wouldn’t have been in a position to purchase
a substantial house, New Place and an acre of ground, dabble in real estate, (Bought
from William and John Combe 107
acres of land in Old Stratford for £320) and go to law issuing writs so the
question I have to ask is, where did this money come from?
Another question is, how did his family in Stratford
keep their heads above water or the wolf from
the door (two beautiful clichés for you there) all the years he was in London? Did he send money home
during the entire period he was absent? If so I reckon that would have depleted
his budget somewhat. What money could he have made out of his poetry and the
plays? Not very much I reckon. There was no such thing as copyright to protect
a writer’s work and anyone who fancied using it could do so without offering any
payment. This copyright problem lasted well into the nineteenth century when
playwrights like Boucicault would hop over to Paris
to see a new play, take notes and hop back to London to write their own version. And even
today the laws of copyright are not always a one hundred percent safeguard as I
know to my cost but that is another story which, if it ever comes to a
conclusion, I will tell you all about. But getting back to Willy, what would
his income have been as a jobbing actor? Probably not much; actors then, like
now, being two a penny. (The star system still had to be invented.) Still, as a
shareholder in the theatre he would have made money there so maybe that is the
answer. Or was he supplied with a continual stream of the readies by a patron?
The Earl of Southampton?

No, apart from,
where did he get his money; it was his apparent mind-set that worries me. Was
his behaviour symptomatic of a universal genius? Mooted as the greatest writer
in the English language? How did he behave on his return to Stratford? Did he have with him copies of the
plays or the poems? Was mention ever made of his career in the theatre? Was
there even talk of plays? Did he not own a single book? Do we know if he could
even write as all we have are those six signatures? There are those who believe
that, being the offspring of illiterate parents and begetting his own
illiterate offspring, William Shakespeare of Stratford
on Avon could neither read nor write. He
describes himself as “William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon in the county of Warwick, gentleman.”Maybe the coat-of-arms, originally applied
for by his father was indicative of his standing in the community.

After His long absence and having made
quite a reputation for himself how was he greeted on his return to his home town?
As a famous man of letters? Someone of consequence, if not renown? Someone to
talk about and applaud? A VIP of the period? Was there a fanfare of trumpets,
the proverbial red carpet, a banquet, the equivalent of a ticker tape
reception? It would seem not. As far as the good folk of Stratford were concerned he was merely
another citizen and merchant albeit a rich one now. His reputation in the last
few years of his life didn’t seem to amount to much but over the years, over
the centuries, his history became so embellished that in the nineteenth century
it got to the point of being what Bernard Shaw described as ‘Bardolatry’.

By now statues and monuments were springing
up all over the place which brings me to the biggest mystery of all; the
Shakespeare monument in Holy trinity Church,
Stratford. The
first sketch was made by William Dugdale in 1634. In 1656 it appeared in ‘Antiquities
of Warwickshire’ an engraving by Hollar followed in 1709 by a copy. In all
these illustrations Shakespeare is shown with his hands on what is possibly a woolsack
indicating a merchant and it wasn’t until 1725 that suddenly a quill appeared
in his right hand and a piece of paper in his left. Has there ever been an
explanation for this?

In September 1856 a man named William Henry
Smith of Harley Street
wrote –

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S is indeed a negative
history.

Of his life all that we positively know is the
period of his death.

We do not know when he was born, nor when,
nor where, he was educated.

We do not know when or where he was married,
nor when he came to London.

We do not know when, where, or in what
order, his plays were written or performed; nor when he left London.

Friday, August 17, 2012

Have been reading Ken Follett’s ‘Fall Of
Giants,’ a ripping gripping yarn all 850
pages of it with a cast of millions (First Word War/ Russian Revolution) no,
but seriously, folks, I really have enjoyed it, nose glued to the page whenever
possible. But alas, oh, alas, another author for whom the past tense is summed
up in only one word – “ago!” Damn it all ago ago ago ago when there are so many
ways of describing the past. Am I the only reader to be irritated by it? Hang
on, where did I complain about this before? Could it have been Ken Follett with
‘Pillars Of The Earth?’ A book I also thoroughly enjoyed. I don’t remember and
I’m not going back however many Blogs to find out. If he is the culprit both
times cut “alas, oh, alas, another author,” above, it obviously doesn’t apply –
except I am now reading ‘Broken Idols’ by Sean Flannery and guess what – it’s
ago time again! Turns out he’s another wordsmith whose only description of the
past is ‘ago.’ Ago ago ago. Everything that ever happened happened ago. It’s a
shame really that otherwise perfectly acceptable writing should be spoilt or is
it just me being ultra-finicky in old age? I see I bought it in the second-hand
shop in Xania for 100 drachmas so that must be all of fifteen years ago!

Human beings really are the weirdest animals. The world
is full of the strangest and most exotic foods. Chinese supermarkets are awash
with them; to most of which Westerners would turn up their noses or puke quite violently. The Japanese
delicacy fugu, or blowfish, is so poisonous that the smallest mistake in its
preparation could be fatal but Tokyo's
city government is planning to ease restrictions that allow only highly trained
and licensed chefs to serve the dish. Why would one want to eat something
possibly so deadly when there is so much else to chose from?
Chef Kunio Miura always uses his special knives to prepare fugu -
wooden-handled with blades tempered by a wordsmith to a keen edge. Before he
starts work in his kitchen they are brought to him by an assistant, carefully
stored in a special box. Miura-san, as he is respectfully known, has been
cutting up blowfish for 60 years but still approaches the task with caution. A
single mistake could mean a customer’s death.

Fugu is an expensive delicacy and the restaurants that serve it are among
the finest in Japan.
In Miura-san's establishment a meal starts at $120 (£76) a head, but people are
willing to pay for the assurance of the fugu chef licence mounted on his wall,
yellowed now with age. He is one of a select guild authorised by Tokyo's city government to
serve the dish.
In preparation the chef first lays the dispatched fish on its stomach and
cuts open the head to removes its brain and eyes. These are carefully placed in
a metal tray marked "non-edible". Then he removes the skin and starts
cutting at the guts. Pulling out the ovaries “This is the most poisonous part,”
he says. “But the liver and intestines are potentially lethal too. People say
it is 200 times more deadly than cyanide.” The first recorded case can be found
in Captain Cook’s logs in 1774 after crew members ate the fish.
Tetrodotoxin is named after the Tetraodontiformes order of fish, which
includes blowfish. It is also found in blue-ringed octopuses, some toads, newts
and other animals. According to government figures, since 2000 twenty-three
people have died in Japan
after eating fugu, Most of the victims being anglers who rashly tried to prepare
their catch at home. A spokesman for the Health and Welfare Ministry struggles
to think of a single fatality in a restaurant, though last year a woman was
hospitalised after eating a trace of fugu liver in one of Tokyo's top restaurants. Tetrodotoxin
poisoning has been described as "rapid and violent", first a numbness
around the mouth, then paralysis, finally death. The unfortunate diner remains
conscious to the end. There is no antidote. Maybe the hospitalized woman didn’t
eat quite enough.
You don't need to dine out in a Japanese restaurant to sup on potentially
fatal fare. More humble foods could also
be dangerous. Mushrooms, while benign in many varieties, can cause serous
illness including kidney failure and even death. Peanuts can be dangerous to
those with severe nut allergies. Potatoes with a greenish hue can be dangerous
when consumed in large enough quantities. What is a large enough quantity?
Now in Tokyo
fugu is available in some supermarkets and over the internet - one reason why
officials think the strict rules need updating.
In typical Japanese fashion where artistry reigns supreme the translucent slices
of fugu are carefully arranged in the form of chrysanthemum petals served up on
a beautiful floral design plate, the fish sliced so thinly the plate pattern can
be seen underneath. At least you will die appreciating the delicacy of it. In
terms of cost, it is likely fugu would become available in cheaper restaurants but going to a proper fugu restaurant to eat
good wild-caught fish, prepared on-site, is quite a luxury - because of the
cost, if nothing else - and also quite an event. For many, playing the
equivalent of Russian roulette at the dinner table is the attraction of the
dish; that extra thrill that comes with the knowledge that by eating it you are
dicing with death; and your death will be recorded as such and such a time ago!

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

So how about it if we get away from money, sex, and religion and have a couple or
more uplifting stories instead? They come from
South Africa
and one actually does involve money but not in the way I’ve previously written
about it.

The first story comes from Soweto. Theatre has come
a long way in South Africa since I left in 1953, particularly in Cape Town, but
Soweto, a township once home to former President Nelson Mandela, has opened its
first theatre .The eleven million pound project aims to attract tourists and
locals alike. When you think of Soweto’s
history it is really quite a remarkable achievement considering South Africans
of all colours have never been ardent theatre goers.
The second story is the one concerningmoney “She's not a superwoman, she's just an ordinary person doing her job”
is one anti-corruption campaigner's blunt assessment of Thuli Madonsela, the
woman the press often calls just Thuli. Her investigations have led to the
sacking of some of the most senior figures in the state, most recently the
country's former police chief, Bheki Cele, who was suspended over a property
leasing scandal in 2011. The softly spoken mother of two has become a one-woman
corruption crusader. David Lewis, chief executive of the newly launched campaign
group ‘Corruption Watch’ has described her as “South Africa's most important
bulwark against corruption” who has inspired hope among millions of
citizens looking for a better way of life. Mrs. Madonsela has captured the
imagination of South Africans and the media for her no-nonsense style and her
ability to deliver. As a former lawyer in the trade union movement during the
fight against white minority rule and her involvement in the drafting of South Africa's
post-apartheid constitution, she has the respect of the ruling African National
Congress (ANC) party and opposition alike. Over the past few months, Thuli
Madonsela has overseen some 14,000 investigations. She accepts Justice Minister
Jeff Radebe's argument that “300 years of colonial rule and 40 years of
apartheid” cannot be corrected overnight and that the seeds of corruption were
sown long before the first post-apartheid elections in 1994, “But,” she says, “if
visible action is taken against corrupt officials now, then it sends the
message to people that ‘if you are thinking about it - then don't.’” South Africa
has shown that, with a free press and independent courts, it still has a chance
of winning the war on corruption, and in many ways, Mrs. Madonsela embodies
that hope.
The third story involves animals and in its way is as remarkable as the
previous two. Lawrence Anthony, a legend in South
Africa and the author of three books including the
bestseller ‘The Elephants Whisperer’ bravely rescued wildlife and rehabilitated
elephants all over the globe from
human atrocities, including the courageous rescue of Baghdad Zoo animals during
the US
2003 invasion, died on March 7, this year. He is remembered and missed by his
wife, 2 sons, 2 grandsons and numerous elephants.
Two days after his passing the wild elephants showed up at his home led by
two large matriarchs. Separate wild herds arrived to say good-bye to their
beloved man friend. A total of twenty elephants had walked over twelve miles to
get to his South African house in Natal’s
Thula Thula game reserve. Witnessing this spectacle humans were in awe not only
because of the supreme intelligence and precise timing these elephants sensed
but also because of the profound memory and emotion the animals evoked in such
an organized way. They obviously wanted to pay their deep respect honouring their
friend who had saved their lives. So much respect that they stayed for two days
and two nights. Then one morning they left, making their long journey home.
So when one reads stories like that, why is it so many humans have so little
respect for animals? I find it hard to understand, even harder to accept.

Monday, August 13, 2012

The chic-fil-a story is worthy of a
musical, probably along the lines of Spamalot. Moving on to number three -
religion – though I am quite sure sex won’t be too far away. After all in the
previous Blog there was a religious basis to both the sex stories so I don’t
see why this one should be any different.

The Pope's butler has been released from custody and moved to house arrest. The Vatican said
that Paolo Gabriele will remain under house arrest pending a decision on
whether he should stand trial for leaking confidential papers to the media. He
was charged after a series of leaks exposed alleged corruption and internal
conflicts at the Holy See. The so-called "Vatileaks" scandal saw an
Italian investigative journalist publish hundreds of secret documents detailing
fraud scandals, nepotism and cronyism within the Holy See. (So, for goodness sake,
what’s new? They’ve been at it for centuries.) Italian media reported that if
convicted, Mr. Gabriele could face a sentence of up to 30 years for illegal
possession of documents of a head of state, probably to be served in an Italian
prison due to an agreement between Italy
and the Vatican.

Well, secret police forces in various
countries are nothing new but what about morality police? Ever heard about
them? I hadn’t until I read an article in which a family in Saudi Arabia has
accused religious police of being responsible for a fatal car accident. Reports
say morality police argued with the driver of a car listening to children's
songs with his family in a park.

The driver drove off, pursued by the police at speed before losing control
of the car and dying in the crash. What was he so afraid of? A public flogging
maybe? The officers involved have been detained and are being questioned. After
being followed for several kilometres by the police, the fugitive’s car fell
down a bank at an overpass that was still under construction. The man was
killed and the 34-year-old's wife and two children survived the crash but were
injured and remain in hospital.
The Emir of the Baha region is reported to have said he was appalled at how
the religious police behaved. But supporters of the police say they have been
unfairly blamed. Part of their role is to patrol the streets to stop what they
see as infringements of the country's strict Muslim code.
Some have claimed that Mr. al Ghamdi drove through a police checkpoint but
why should the religious police have checkpoints in the first place? Mr. al Ghamdi's family wants a fact-finding
committee to be set up under the direct supervision of the Emir of Baha. A new
head of the religious police was appointed recently and he has tried to rein in
some of its excesses. Incidents like this will only add to a public mood that
is increasingly impatient with what many Saudis see as the religious police's arbitrary
interference in their lives.
There – two religious stories and no sex. What can I say?

Saturday, August 11, 2012

So, after money, what tales do we have to tell about sex?
There is never any shortage of those. How about this one for starters? Several
Pakistani police officers have been suspended after they were accused of
parading a couple naked in public. According to witnesses, police in the Sindh
town of Gambat
forced the man and woman to walk to the police station naked as punishment for
trying to have sex outside marriage. Trying?

Incidents of public dishonouring are not uncommon in Pakistan, but this incident is
particularly shocking because it was carried out by police and filmed on mobile
phones. Last year, several men were arrested for stripping a middle aged woman
naked and parading her round the village as punishment for her son allegedly
having an affair with a woman in their family. So why punish the mother? The
footage of this latest incident shows the man being pushed around and abused by
police officers on his property. He is then forced to walk naked to the police
station, alongside his alleged partner, as a large crowd looks on. Quite
naturally (tell me you are surprised!) religion enters into it. The police said
they took action in response to several public complaints against the man who
has been reportedly holding drink and dance parties during the holy month of
Ramadan.

Now here is another on a much larger scale. It would
appear a certain question is creating a minor tsunami in the southern states of
the US.
Two Republican politicians have urged people to eat at a US fast food
chain, amid a row over gay marriage. Crowds flocked to outlets in several
states after ex-presidential candidates Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee urged
supporters of "traditional values" to eat at Chick-fil-A. Boss of the
fast-food chain, one Dan Cathy said in July he backed the "biblical
definition of a family". He also told the Baptist Press he thought those
who supported gay marriage were "arrogant". Chick-fil-A restaurants
in cities across southern states of the US were reported to be bustling
with customers who turned out in support of the chain on Wednesday. The Houston
Chronicle reports that branches in Houston, Texas, were packed and another restaurant in Atlanta, Georgia,
was said to be so busy two employees were needed to direct traffic in the car
park. Wowie! Think of all that lovely money just pouring in in the name of
Jesus. Hallelujah, praise the Lord. Customers posted videos on line expressing
solidarity with Chick-fil-A, and social media sites including Twitter hummed
with contributions to the discussion.

"The goal is simple: let's affirm a business that operates on Christian
principles and whose executives are willing to take a stand for the godly
values we espouse by simply showing up and eating at Chick-fil-A," said
Mr. Huckabee, a Baptist minister and former governor of the state of Arkansas.
It’s not going all their way though. The general manager of the only
Chick-fil-A outlet in the north-eastern state of New Hampshire has become a sponsor of that
state's gay pride festival, due to take place in August. In a statement,
Anthony Picolia said his restaurant "has gay employees and serves gay
customers with honour, dignity and respect". It’s a pity those southern
fundamentalists don’t have his common sense if nothing else.
I still maintain the use of that emotive word marriage for same-sex unions
has been a big mistake but anyway, what can you do with brain-washed Bible
thumping good Old Testament southern Baptists? Not a lot.

Thursday, August 9, 2012

Thinking back over all I have written in
these Blogs it seems to me, apart from
deviations now and again, that three subjects predominate – sex, religion, and
money. (Maybe deviations was the wrong word to use – should I have said going
off on tangents?) Just as there are primary colours in the spectrum maybe these
are the primary colours of life, as it were. Bit pretentious that but you will
know what I mean. Sometimes it seems they all impose themselves on each other
one way or another and to different degrees. What about politics you say? Well
politics is influenced by all three so that goes without saying.

What little nuggets of information on any
of these subjects do I have for you today? Well let’s start with money that
reputedly (and in all likelihood does in fact) makes the world go round.

I read that the global super-rich elite had at least $21
trillion (£13tn) hidden in secret tax havens by the end of 2010, according to a
major study. In fact $21tn is probably a conservative figure and the true scale
could be $32tn. A trillion by the by is 1,000 billion. This is only with
financial wealth deposited in bank and investment accounts, and not other
assets such as property and yachts.

The group that commissioned the report, Tax
Justice Network, campaigns against tax havens. They said the super-rich move
money around the globe through an "industrious bevy of professional
enablers in private banking, legal, accounting and investment industries. The lost
tax revenues implied by the estimates is huge. It is large enough to make a
significant difference to the finances of many countries. The report highlights
the impact on the balance sheets of 139 developing countries of money held in
tax havens that is put beyond the reach of local tax authorities. Fewer than
100,000 people worldwide own about $9.8tn of the wealth held offshore. Governments
are evidently now trying to claw back all their lost tax revenue.

Colm O Regan on the BBC News Magazine writes, “The mind can't comprehend the
amount. If it was denominated in $1 bills, it would fill nearly 10,000
Olympic-sized swimming pools. Provided the pools were empty and that it was
possible to provide enough security personnel to guard all of the pools. Overwrought
quantification metaphors aside, $21tn is a lot of money to stash. How would you
even go about hiding it? With the entire output of the world's economy only
being about $60tn (£39tn) or so, surely like an elephant hiding behind a
curtain, you would notice the bulge somewhere?
Except now the elephant isn’t even in the room.”

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

I have read any number of books on the life
of William Shakespeare. I suppose one should really refer to them as
biographies but, as so much is invention, maybe fiction would be a better
description. The problem is we really don’t know very much at all about the man
so these books are littered with phrases like ‘we think,’ or ‘we believe,’ ‘it’s
possible that,’ ‘it could very well have been’ ‘perhaps,’ etcetera. It takes
quite a lot of these and some imagination and ingenuity to write a book of a few
hundred pages on not just scanty but almost non-existent material. Taking a
quick glance over my shoulder at the books on my shelves I see I have ‘A Life
of William Shakespeare’ by Sir Sydney Lee 1898, ‘Shakespeare’s Lives’ by S.
Schoenbaum, ‘Shakespeare of London’ by M.Shute, ‘’Who Was Shakespeare?’ by
H.Amphlett, ‘Elizabethan Drama’ in two volumes by Felix Schelling, naturally
choc-a-bloc full of Shakespeare, ‘ The Lodger’ by Charles Nicholl, described by
James Shapiro in The Guardian as
‘Part biography, part detective story, Nicholl’s latest work ranks among the
finest books ever written about Shakespeare’s life.’ Then there is ‘Shakespeare
and the Earl of Southampton’ by C.P.V. Akrigg and ‘The Shakespearian Ciphers
Examined’ by William and Elizabeth Friedman. ‘The Elizabethan Theatre’ papers
given at the University of Waterloo, Ontario, 1972 with a number of
contributors. I am sure the are more books on Shakespeare in my room,
downstairs, and upstairs but you get the picture and, if I were to look up Amazon
now, I think there have been half a dozen more published in this celebratory
year as though not enough had already been written about the man and what can possibly
be said that hasn’t already been said? Now, in all the books I have read with
all their nebulous maybes and perhapses, of one fact they are in unanimous
agreement and of which they believe there is absolutely no conceivable doubt, and
that is, being a Stratford lad, Shakespeare obviously attended the Stratford
school to learn a modicum of Latin and even less Greek, but whoa there! Now hang
on a cotton-picking minute! There is another book I haven’t mentioned – ‘The Backgrounds
of Shakespeare’s Plays’ by Karl Holzknecht and what do I read in this volume? Wait
for it… ‘There is no evidence that Shakespeare attended Stratford
Grammar School,’ and on page 22 ‘There
are no records of the Stratford
Grammar School for this
period.’ So from where did all these
authors get the fact that Shakespeare was schooled in Stratford?

To quote Mr. Holzknecht ‘Every outline of
Shakespeare’s life should distinguish sharply between two kinds of material;
(a) what is known to be true and can be verified by the records (very little)
and (b) what may, could, or should be true – the incrustations of tradition.,
conjecture, and inference which surround the facts … universal gossip and surmise,
repeated often enough and sufficiently embroidered with plausibility, soon
acquire both the charm and the certainty of truth. (an awful lot). The big
mystery is how, in the time he was in London,
Shakespeare could have written 37 major plays, 160 sonnets plus epic poetry,
not even burning the candle at both ends. It defies all sense of logic. And for
those who won’t hear a word said against the man they come up with one argument
they feel cannot be gainsaid - “Genius!” and that solves the mystery – or does
it?

Sunday, August 5, 2012

I find it interesting, you might not but I
find it interesting, how different authors say the same thing but each in their
own way. I have just finished reading a novel given to us some years ago by an
Australian friend. It is called “Loaded” by Christos Tsiolkas and, told in the
first person, is all about a nineteen year old son of Greek immigrants in Melbourne. Published by
Vintage it was sponsored by The Australian Council for the Arts. Its basic
theme as far as I can work out is hate. His name is Ari and he hates his parents,
he hates everyone in Australia,
he hates himself for not having the courage to be himself, and he hates his home
city of Melbourne.
He would like to say ‘I adore you’ to someone he fancies like crazy but finds
he simply can’t say it and every sexual encounter is, to put it mildly, short
and brutal. In the course of the action which I suppose is over two or three
days (not quite sure about the time scale) he takes enough drugs, alcohol and
nicotine to kill a herd of elephants but doesn’t even suffer brewer’s droop, in
fact just the opposite. The novel starts off with masturbation. It seems
strange that not all that long ago books like “Fanny Hill” and “Lady Chatterley’s
Lover” (Would you like your servants to read this?) were legally banned but
today as the old Cole Porter song has it, anything goes. “In olden days a
glimpse of stocking was looked on as something shocking but now, heaven knows,
anything goes. Good authors too who once knew better words, now only use four
letter words, writing prose, anything goes.” And, my god does Mister Tsiolkas use
those four letter words ad nauseum. It would seem he can’t get enough out of
them and in the end their repetition becomes simply boring. Okay, I’m not
saying that’s not how Ari wouldn't speak and think but it shows a great dearth of
imagination that there are no moments of escape from
it. I remember on the Braemar Castle when I was working my way to England as a
lowly bathroom steward all those many years ago there was another young steward
who couldn’t put two words together without the f-word coming in between. But
what started me off on this? Well it is how Ari describes himself at the end of
the book. “My epitaph;” he writes, “he slept, he ate, he fucked, he pissed, he
shat… that’s his story.” Now how does Matthew Prior say the same thing? “What
trifling coil do we poor mortals keep; Wake, eat and drink, evacuate and
sleep.” There is nothing new under the sun, just a different way of saying it.

Christos does make one interesting comment continuing
the theme of hatred, “The Serb hates the Croat who hates the Bosnian who hates
the Albanian who hates the Greek who hates the Turk who hates the Armenian who
hates the Kurd who hates the Palestinian who hates the Jew who hates everybody.”

And it won’t change. “Idols of the tribe
are deceptive beliefs inherent in the mind of man, and therefore belonging to
the whole of the human race.” Sir Francis Bacon, and “The only real danger that exists is man
himself. He is the great danger.”Jung.

Friday, August 3, 2012

Evidently the Iranians don’t rate Alexander
the Great as being so great. In fact in the war crimes category, had there been
such a thing at that time, he would have been taken to court and severely punished
for his vandalism.

Alexander the Great is portrayed as a legendary conqueror and military
leader in Greek-influenced Western history books but his legacy looks very
different from a Persian perspective.
According to Ali
Ansari, professor in modern history and director of The Institute of Iranian
Studies at The University of St Andrews, Scotland, he is “that man” who
destroyed the city of Persepolis,the ceremonial capital of the ancient Persian Achaemenid empire,
it’s history told in three facts: (1) built by Darius the Great, (2) embellished
by his son Xerxes, and (3) destroyed by that man, Alexander. History
has it he razed Persepolis
to the ground following a night of drunken excess at the goading of a Greek
courtesan, ostensibly in revenge for the burning of the Acropolis by the
Persian ruler Xerxes. Could that be a true story I wonder? The man feted in
Western culture as one of the great military geniuses of history destroying his
reputation at the whim of a Greek whore?
Persians also condemn him for the widespread destruction he is thought to
have encouraged to cultural and religious sites throughout the empire. Alexander
would have been familiar from
boyhood with stories of The Persian Empire and, although characterised by the
Persians as a destroyer, a reckless and somewhat feckless youth, and the
evidence suggests that Alexander retained a healthy respect for the Persians
themselves and came to regret the destruction his invasion caused. Coming
across the plundered tomb of Cyrus the Great in Pasargad, a little north of Persepolis, he was evidently
much distressed by what he found and immediately ordered repairs to be made. Had
Alexander lived beyond his 32 years, he may yet have restored and repaired much
more. In time, the Persians were to come to terms with their Macedonian
conqueror, absorbing him into the fabric of national history.
The Persian Empire was in fact worth conquering not because it was in need
of civilising but because it was the greatest empire the world had yet seen,
extending from Central Asia to Libya.
Persia
was an enormously rich prize. There is ample evidence that the Greeks admired
the Persian Empire and the emperors who ruled
it. Alexander came to admire what he found, so much so that he was keen to take
on the Persian mantle of the King of Kings. And thus it is that in the great
Iranian national epic, the Shahnameh, written in the 10th Century AD, Alexander
is no longer a wholly foreign prince but one born of a Persian mother.
Persian emperors Darius and Xerxes both invaded Greece, and were both ultimately
defeated. But, remarkably, Greeks flocked to the Persian court. Themistocles, falling
foul of Athenian politics, fled to the Persian Empire
and eventually found employment at the Persian Court and was made a provincial
governor, where he lived out the rest of his life. In time, the Persians found
that they could achieve their objectives in Greece
by playing the Greek city states against each other, and in the Peloponnesian
War, Persian money financed the Spartan victory against Athens. How often does history repeat itself?

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Cults! ‘Oh, God!’ I hear you say, ‘he’s
back on the religious kick. How boring.’ Well, yes, I suppose I am, but
actually I probably never left it, well not for long anyway because of its
endless fascination. Three events got me thinking about cults: firstly the
Cruise/Holmes divorce, secondly, a song sung by George Leybourne that Chris has
been working on called ‘Shy, Shy, Dreadfully Shy’ in which Leybourne evidently parodied
a certain Shaker of the time and thirdly a news report on the capture in Japan of
the last fugitive of the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult, ending a 17-year manhunt.
Katsuya Takahashi is suspected of involvement in the 1995 sarin nerve gas
attack on the Tokyo
subway system that killed 13 people and injured 6000. Another former member of
Aum Shinrikyo, Makoto Hirata, turned himself in to police after nearly 17 years
on the run.Nearly 200 Aum Shinrikyo
members have been convicted in connection with the sarin attack and other
crimes. Thirteen are awaiting execution. Aum Shinrikyo began as a spiritual
group in the 1980s, mixing Hindu and Buddhist beliefs but developed into a
paranoid cult obsessed with Armageddon. Cult leader Shoko Asahara is among
those on death row. Aum Shinrikyo has reinvented itself as the Aleph group,
which continues to operate as a spiritual group and is believed to have about
1000 members.

So what is the difference between a cult
and religion, between a sect and a cult? Maybe a cult becomes a religion after
a long period of time when it gains millions of followers whereas a cult is of
a brief duration and its followers may be fanatical but are relatively few in
number. All religions must have started off as a cult and cults branch out from established religions and sects, witness the
Davidians in Texas,
an offshoot of 7th Day Adventists. Eighteen years after Waco that resulted in the deaths of at least
76 people there are still Davidians who believe that Koresh was God so, like
the Aum Shinrikyo, the cult is still alive if in a different form. That cannot
be said for the People's Temple Christian Church when in 1978 the bodies of 914
people, including 276 children, were found in Guyana South America after a mass
suicide; the charismatic (mad?) leader of the cult, Jim Jones, killing himself
with a bullet to the head. The dead, evidently intense fearful of the end of
civilisation, had consumed a soft drink laced with cyanide and sedatives.

So what about Scientology? Is it a religion
or is it a cult? Started in 1952 by a writer of science fiction, Ron L. Hubbard
how different is it say to something like ex-footballer David Icke’s belief that a secret group of
reptilian humanoids called The Babylonian Brotherhood controls humanity? They
include (he says) such figures as George Bush and Queen Elizabeth. So much for
secrecy. .’ Oh,
boy! . I was watching a programme on
religion on the net and a young man was heard to say ‘I don’t really know what
it is all about…but I want to go to heaven!’ It was a cry from the heart and that is the basis of religion,
sect, and cult; but in the words of Christopher Marlowe, atheist and
blasphemer, ‘We remember nothing before we are born and we will remember
nothing after we are dead.’

About Me

Ex actor, ex director, still a writer, prose now no longer plays. Like the Godfather growing tomatoes. No, too old to garden but still writing - my autobiography No Official Umbrella - same title as my Blogs and soon to come out in paperback, novels and of course my favorite detective Thornton King